Riptide GP2 Review

Time to get wet and wild in Vector Unit‘s sequel to the gorgeous jet ski hydro jet racing series titled Riptide GP2. This time Riptide GP2 brings to the table tons of new features including an all new career mode, online multiplayer, an all new stunt system and a whole lot more. In addition to all the new features, Riptide GP2 is beautiful and has been called console rivaling.

Stunts for Speed

Control wise Riptide GP2 works like a charm. Acceleration is automatic and you just tilt your device to steer left and right. On tight turns there is brake buttons so you don’t go careening into the walls. There is also a boost button that can shoot you ahead of your competition. This boost bar really is a huge component of winning races and a huge component of that is in stunts. At the beginning you just have “tier 1” stunts but there is a whole variety of them which correspond to different touch screen swipe commands. For instance swiping both fingers upwards does a handlebar trick, but swiping them both down, or out from each other, etc. does different tricks. As you win races you rank up and gain skill points you can use to unlock better and more complicated stunts which require a longer string of touch screen inputs.

Pimp That Hydro Jet

In addition to gaining experience from races to level up you also gain prize money for placing in first, second or third. This money is then used to customize your hydro jet in a multitude of ways. First off you can tweak the performance of your existing hydro jet to improve acceleration, top speed, handling, etc. But you can also purchase better hydro jets which have better base stats as well as actually customize them in terms of painting them however you want.

Variety of Styles

One of the better things about Riptide GP2 is there is a ton of different race types of modes of gameplay to keep you busy. For singleplayer career mode there are three types of gameplay; normal lap races, hot lap where you need to get the best time in just one lap and elimination where the last place player gets eliminated every 15 seconds. Getting first in these races gets you three star rankings which are used to unlock new maps and therefore more content. But one of the new features in GP2 this time around is in the multiplayer mode. While it is fairly basic and straightforward the multiplayer mode is still awesome and pretty well done. Matches are set up pretty quickly and I have not had any connection or lag problems. Furthermore I like how the map picking is vote based and that works nicely as well.

Front Row Will Get Wet

Get ready to get wet playing Riptide GP2 as the graphics and performance is so optimized that you really feel like you’re zooming across the water. Riptide GP2 is running the new Vector Engine 4 which allows for stunning HD graphics and is exclusively optimized for Tegra 4 which has complex shaders and dynamic lighting. The end product to all that technological jargon is a beautiful game. The way the sun glimmers off the water and how the water flows and splashes about makes me feel like I’m playing an Xbox game or something. There are even effects like when you hit a big wave your screen has water droplets on it giving the illusion you really are the rider.

Worth it?

The big question of course is if Riptide GP2 is worth the price tag of $2.99. This is a dollar more than the original Riptide GP and I suppose more than the typical wave of just $.099 mobile games. However for what Riptide GP2 offers I feel it is definitely worth the price. You’re getting tons of singleplayer functionality, great online multiplayer mode and stunning console rivaling graphics on a mobile device. What more do you want?